diving into our planet’s final frontier

Scripps scientists along for ride as group aims to explore oceans’ deepest parts

Welsh came up with the concept of “five dives” — descending to the deepest spot in each of the world’s five oceans over a span of about two years. “I just sort of sat back and looked at what could be done, and going to the deepest places in each of the five oceans kind of bubbled to the top,” he said.

Welsh connected with pioneering submarine designer Graham Hawkes to complete the 21st-century underwater flying machine that will be deployed from the catamaran, now called Cheyenne, which makes Newport Harbor its home port. After a couple of test dives, Welsh plans to pilot the Challenger into the Mariana Trench himself — making it the first of the five planned expeditions.

“You don’t want to go out and strain it on a bunch of 29,000-foot dives and … then go to the max,” Welsh said.

Welsh also connected with British billionaire Richard Branson, a close friend of Fossett’s, whose company Virgin Galactic aims to popularize space travel. As part of Branson’s collection of business ventures, Virgin Oceanic pulled together marine experts who could manage deep dives and leverage them for science. Welsh said the men are mostly financing the enterprise themselves, though
virginoceanic.com does list a few sponsors.

The vision started coming into focus in October on the Baja California coast. Branson did his sub pilot training there, and Kisfaludy dove alongside to capture the moment on video.

For Kisfaludy, who graduated from San Diego State University, it was more than a photo op; it was a logistics shakedown for bigger expeditions. The next month, Kisfaludy heard about a 67-foot fin whale washing ashore at Point Loma. Initial plans were to cut up the creature and dump it in a landfill, but Kisfaludy quickly devised another idea: sink the whale for scientific study off the county’s coastline.

After a necropsy, Cheyenne towed the whale offshore, where it was saddled with chains and dropped to the ocean floor.

Kisfaludy said Virgin’s rapid-response ability could be used worldwide, say, to assess spots where tsunamis start. “Wouldn’t it be interesting to mobilize a submarine that could go to places like this, look at the geology shortly after it happens and provide reports?” he said.

The whale-tow capitalized on Kisfaludy’s experience at Scripps, where he worked as the curator of field operations and a marine biological collector for a decade. “If someone said, ‘I need five snails, two lobsters, five tunas and a juvenile thresher shark and while you are out there, put a couple of tags on some gray whales,’ I’d say, ‘I’ll try,’ ” Kisfaludy said. “It’s exciting to do things that would be seemingly impossible and make those reality.”

He said he left Scripps in 2010 to start his own business, then fell in with Welsh. “I’m part of Virgin Oceanic to get the world excited about the deep sea,” Kisfaludy said.

Another key component of the Virgin Oceanic team is marine engineer Kevin Hardy at Scripps. He’s known as the “lander commander” because he’s in charge of designing untethered robots that carry an array of scientific instruments to the seafloor in coordination with the Challenger dives. The sub is expected to have high-definition cameras and powerful lights, and the robots will sample the depths for science.

Bartlett hopes the landers can be guided to interesting spots with help from the Challenger pilot.

“We wouldn’t just be sampling blind,” Bartlett said. “We would have a pair of eyes that would direct us to really exciting discoveries that could be made.”